| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| find | 61 | 73.99438 |
| easi | 62 | 58.07969 |
| difficult | 61 | 56.10016 |
| not | 77 | 54.41997 |
| inform | 22 | 45.16101 |
| pretti | 16 | 35.59398 |
| websit | 14 | 35.17228 |
| aid | 15 | 34.33743 |
| faculti | 12 | 33.59985 |
| financi | 13 | 31.61942 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Class Size | Class size/cohort size isn’t listed, core curriculum is not too difficult to find |
| Undergraduate | It was a bit confusing to find the undergraduate section on the website as everything said “Graduate school”, but once I found the undergraduate education button, everything I needed was right there |
| Tediousness | not difficult but took a lot of time to click through every faculty profile |
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| find | 42 | 59.65795 |
| not | 37 | 56.91378 |
| inform | 30 | 53.55211 |
| student | 27 | 48.19690 |
| research | 12 | 35.09406 |
| info | 15 | 34.43844 |
| class | 14 | 33.10845 |
| difficult | 14 | 33.10845 |
| size | 13 | 31.70696 |
| noth | 12 | 31.27261 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Financial Aid | For financial aid, I wonder if it’s possible to provide department-level contacts for that information? I know that funding is at least in part department-based and my department says that prospective students should email someone in my department for information on it. |
| Faculty Research | It could be confusing when looking for the professors/staff members and it is located under research. For new or perspective students, it could be confusing to find if they do not correlate research with faculty profiles. Also, finding information on projects that faculty and students are working on is difficult/impossible to find. There is not a place to find information on maternal health, firearm research, epid-based research, etc. |
| Page Layout | The key information was on the front of each page, but if I wanted a more specific search, I feel that it would require too many extra clicks/pages to navigate through |
| Degree Info | information regarding certificate ‘degrees’ seems to be challenging to find, further news articles from the vector and so forth could be easier to find |
| Employment | How students can get involved in research and where they can find resources for internships |
| Course Offering | Course offerings and professor research interests are not accurate and up to date. Nothing about job opportunities for masters students. Nothing about class sizes. |
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| student | 61 | 65.78298 |
| inform | 25 | 47.48475 |
| like | 22 | 43.88341 |
| see | 20 | 42.00122 |
| mayb | 20 | 40.91987 |
| websit | 12 | 32.25417 |
| testimoni | 12 | 31.11045 |
| info | 11 | 28.51791 |
| program | 10 | 27.93208 |
| research | 10 | 27.93208 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Financial Aid | More information on how students can afford to attend school here that is not just financial aid information. Perhaps more resources on how to negotiate GSRA positions/research positions for masters students. I know doctoral students are prioritized for such positions, but I don’t think that means masters students should be discounted from being able to securely afford school. |
| Student Testimonial | more student testimonials through videos, personal accounts |
| Page Organization | If there was a page that had more direct links or more clear locations for information and documentation |
| Program Experience | I would like the website to more accurately reflect what the program is like. The nutrition site mentions all of these focus areas but once you get here they are impossible to actually do because of the class schedules. The website looks great, but be honest |
| Uniqueness | I would like to see something more about why Michigan SPH specifically. What separates this program from elsewhere? |
| Research & Intern | I would like to see a more clear list of research done by faculty to be able to search for specific research topics as opposed to just faculty listings. |
The distribution of scores from Master’s students appears very similar to the distribution of scores from Undergraduate students. A Wilcoxon Rank-Sum Test was carried out to test if these distributions are the same. This test yielded a p-value of 0.5558, which suggests the scores do not differ significantly between Master’s and Undergraduate students (since the p-value is greater than the 0.05 significance level).
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| student | 36 | 54.14679 |
| media | 31 | 48.62709 |
| 30 | 47.05848 | |
| social | 28 | 45.85305 |
| look | 17 | 38.44997 |
| 17 | 37.35282 | |
| program | 13 | 33.43493 |
| websit | 13 | 32.30379 |
| rank | 13 | 31.26323 |
| news | 11 | 28.29110 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Rankings | school rankings from third party sites, previous student experiences (such as blogs) |
| Social Media | The twitter or facebook page, they give an idea of more of the day to day in the program |
| Networking | I sign up for panels with current students and alums, and try to connect with people online. |
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| aid | 65 | 53.04295 |
| financi | 66 | 52.85134 |
| program | 30 | 51.97008 |
| class | 30 | 49.74684 |
| locat | 33 | 49.29953 |
| research | 25 | 45.30947 |
| student | 25 | 44.28892 |
| size | 23 | 43.68597 |
| opportun | 21 | 41.88871 |
| curriculum | 12 | 30.06631 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Program Requirements | Application requirements, dates to apply and hear back, costs, admission rates, program oppourtunities and specialties |
| Networking | Curriculum, network, careers and salaries of alumni, culture of the school, extracurricular opportunities |
| Degree Program | Class size, specialty programs, application requirements, classes required by degree programs, certificates and dual degree programs offered |
| Financial Aid | financial aid, scholarships |
| Class Size | Class size, ranking |
| Research | When I was looking for graduate schools the first things that I searched for was the type of research faculty were doing and the funding availability at the university. If I found someone that worked on the same research I was interested in then I would want to find their email and contact them about their ability to take on new students. |
| Category | P-Value |
|---|---|
| Location | <0.0001 |
| Faculty Information | <0.0001 |
| Student Life | 0.0004 |
| Financial Aid (Scholarships and Funding) | 0.0844 |
| Department-Specific Information | 0.0026 |
| Career Outcomes | <0.0001 |
| Degree Requirements | <0.0001 |
| Research Areas/Areas of Study | <0.0001 |
Interpretation: Research Areas, Degree Requirements, Career Outcomes, and Department-Specific Information were ranked as the most important considerations when applying to Michigan Public Health. Location, Faculty, and Student Life tended to be ranked lower in terms of importance. Financial Aid received a fairly even mix of high and low rankings, and the results of the Wilcoxon-Signed Rank Tests suggest that it is the only category with ranks symmetric around the middle value of 4.5.
| Category | P-Value |
|---|---|
| Location | 0.2175 |
| Faculty Information | 0.0312 |
| Student Life | 0.0212 |
| Financial Aid (Scholarships and Funding) | 0.1869 |
| Department-Specific Information | 0.0114 |
| Career Outcomes | 0.0003 |
| Degree Requirements | 0.2121 |
| Research Areas/Areas of Study | 0.2234 |
Interpretation: Undergraduate students rank Career Outcomes and Student Life as significantly more important than Master’s students do. Master’s students rank Faculty Information and Department-Specific Information as significantly more important than Undergraduate students do. This is observed in both the figure and the Wilcoxon Ranked-Sum Tests.
The average rating of the SPH website is 84/100. The average rating from undergrads is 88/100 and average rating from master’s students is 81/100. Most undergaduate students rated the website at 90/100 or above. There was a wider distribution in the ratings from Master’s students, but most Master’s students rated the SPH website at 80/100 or above.
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| websit | 7 | 14.33385 |
| like | 11 | 13.60439 |
| find | 10 | 13.54546 |
| not | 6 | 12.28616 |
| easi | 11 | 11.39701 |
| navig | 10 | 11.31402 |
| inform | 8 | 10.83637 |
| student | 5 | 10.23846 |
| main | 3 | 8.22252 |
| requir | 3 | 8.22252 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Aesthetics | Aesthetically pleasing, easy to navigate |
| Accessibility | Accessing certain pages may be difficult sometimes, due to many search options. |
| Aesthetics(Redundant) | Easy to navigate, clear/understandable |
| Usefulness | As a current Master’s student, I rarely use the main University of Michigan website. Most of the resources we have are on Wolverine Access and Canvas. That’s probably one thing I don’t like is that the resources are split up between Maize, Wolverine and the main website so it’s hard to find where I need to find things. e.g. To find the academic calendar, I always have to google “University of Michigan academic calendar” because I don’t know where it lives… Regarding the update on the SPH website, I like how the competencies are now included but I wish there was more information about graduation requirements - e.g. APEX, internship requirements, etc. I continuously have to refer to the student handbook for EPID, which I think should be included in the website. |
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| not | 8 | 15.096557 |
| inform | 8 | 13.637985 |
| video | 14 | 13.041815 |
| like | 9 | 12.753594 |
| see | 8 | 12.404779 |
| imag | 11 | 12.084735 |
| student | 7 | 10.854182 |
| pictur | 4 | 9.591581 |
| current | 5 | 9.435348 |
| link | 4 | 8.440853 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Event Gallery | I like to see pictures of relevant public health events, like the picture of the coronavirus that was on there |
| Versatility | I like to see a variety of things at once on a homepage, usually photos, boomerangs or gifs and not necessarily videos, with short (about 1-2 sentence long) descriptions along with them. If there are videos on a website’s homepage, I will typically only engage with them if they’re <4 minutes long. |
| Basic Info | Suggestions such as graduate program information, admissions info, faculty info |
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| mobil | 12 | 14.327070 |
| good | 10 | 12.992830 |
| websit | 9 | 12.753594 |
| phone | 10 | 11.939225 |
| not | 6 | 10.228489 |
| experi | 5 | 9.435348 |
| use | 5 | 9.435348 |
| frustrat | 4 | 8.440853 |
| difficult | 3 | 7.193686 |
| issu | 3 | 7.193686 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Comparison with web | The mobile experience actually looks better than the desktop version! The current website is well-formatted for mobile browsing. |
| Layout | The quality is fairly good but not excellent. |
| The scaling of graphic | s and menus is okay but the site is harder to navigate than on the web version. |
| No Comment | I’ve never had an issue using the website on my phone |
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| health | 9 | 17.25230 |
| public | 9 | 17.25230 |
| appli | 13 | 14.67005 |
| program | 8 | 13.87681 |
| admiss | 7 | 12.14221 |
| can | 5 | 12.13874 |
| requir | 9 | 11.96222 |
| offer | 6 | 11.50154 |
| michigan | 5 | 10.70033 |
| student | 5 | 10.70033 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Application Procedure | How to apply, what the cost will be, what programs are offered, what the requirements are for admission. how to apply for scholarships/funding, school calendar, courses offered, university sph accomplishments and statistics. |
| Why Public Health | 1) how to make the transition from LSA or wherever to public health2) when people typically transfer to public health3) some careers made from going to public health or spotlights on people who work in public health |
| Building & Faculty Info | I don’t attend there but I would find building and faculty info helpful. I often need building info and struggle to find it for a lot of umich sites |
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| program | 5 | 10.397208 |
| find | 6 | 10.043859 |
| yes | 19 | 9.904642 |
| curriculum | 4 | 9.468495 |
| difficult | 4 | 8.317766 |
| easi | 4 | 8.317766 |
| inform | 4 | 8.317766 |
| need | 3 | 7.101371 |
| requir | 3 | 7.101371 |
| see | 2 | 6.931472 |
| Example |
|---|
| No, when applying here I found it difficult to find the requirements needed and access to an example schedule for the school year. |
| It was kind of difficult to navigate the programs because I kept getting results related to the masters program. |
| I had difficulty finding the true curriculum (but they were changing the curriculum on us so that’s probably why) |
| I remember having a hard time getting to the information I needed when I was applying to the school. |
| I see the application really easily, but I don’t see much about the program itself (like the curriculum) |
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| understand | 6 | 9.853366 |
| not | 3 | 8.222520 |
| clear | 4 | 8.190771 |
| easi | 4 | 8.190771 |
| curriculum | 3 | 7.006125 |
| requir | 3 | 7.006125 |
| difficult | 2 | 5.481680 |
| new | 2 | 5.481680 |
| program | 2 | 5.481680 |
| yes | 25 | 5.377784 |
| Example |
|---|
| Once located, it was very easy to understand. It was outlined very nicely, but getting to the page was difficult. |
| The curriculum wasn’t as easy to find and understand when I was applying, especially for specific tracks. |
| No, the last time I looked, it included requirements from before the new course standards were implemented. |
| Curriculum may be a little difficult to understand with new requirements (APEX, ILE, etc), otherwise yes |
| Not really. |
| Curriculum for the different programs is not very clear. |
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| not | 12 | 12.433103 |
| difficult | 14 | 11.129018 |
| easi | 6 | 10.947296 |
| hard | 3 | 7.006125 |
| inform | 3 | 7.006125 |
| page | 3 | 7.006125 |
| websit | 3 | 7.006125 |
| aid | 2 | 6.867974 |
| find | 2 | 5.481680 |
| fine | 2 | 5.481680 |
| Example |
|---|
| It was fairly easy, the entire financial aid page that I pulled up was well-ordered, starting with breakdown of costs in a sheet format and then presenting aid opportunities after that. |
| Yes, but it would be nice if there was a little more info on each of the funding sources rather than just linking you away |
| For someone that is new to the website it can prove to be difficult. Had to search through many tabs before accessing it. |
| Kinda hard- compared to other information, but I think they are less universal than all others too. |
| Scholarships take you to other websites, might be easier to have some listed on the page. |
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| tab | 6 | 12.661279 |
| make | 6 | 11.322418 |
| student | 7 | 10.854182 |
| inform | 5 | 10.551066 |
| find | 6 | 10.228489 |
| like | 4 | 8.440853 |
| link | 4 | 8.440853 |
| page | 4 | 8.440853 |
| think | 4 | 8.440853 |
| click | 3 | 8.410081 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Nothing | I like it a lot so i don’t know |
| Popular Links and Events | Make it easier to find information on webinar information session dates and times |
| Layout | I think it was fairly easy to find but regarding faculty profiles, it was difficult to navigate because you had to click into every professor to get a snapshot of their research. I wished that it was an infinite scroll with just maybe two sentences or “research interests” listed so that I could click into professors that hit certain criteria. |
| Font | You could make the font bigger, but other than that, there is really nothing else that would need to be done. |
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| live | 12 | 14.327070 |
| know | 9 | 12.753594 |
| not | 7 | 11.933237 |
| import | 19 | 11.516580 |
| find | 5 | 10.551066 |
| hous | 6 | 10.228489 |
| option | 6 | 10.228489 |
| student | 6 | 10.228489 |
| think | 4 | 9.591581 |
| ann | 5 | 9.435348 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Atmosphere | For cross-campus transfer students like myself, it was nonessential, but I believe that conveying how exciting the town is is important because many people who are from warmer climates have negative connotations associated with Michigan weather/winters. |
| Living Cost | I think it is important. I think it would be good to give a sense of cost of living in the area, dining/entertainment options and ease of public transport. |
| Housing | where to find housing, what are the costs of living, where they can find a roommate if needed, and it might be nice to include information about ann arbor: festivals, recreation areas, grocery store locations, etc. |
| Traffic | Very important. They should know:- how expensive it is (not just the housing, but also the food, activities) -Bus routes (and how they won’t be very active during holidays - the routes are made to assume that students go home during breaks) |
Students replied that degree requirements were the most important to them, followed by career outcomes, research areas/areas of study, financial aid, and department specific information. Student life and faculty information often ranked below a 4.
This analysis changes when we look at the student’s affiliation. Career outcomes were more important to Master’s students than undergraduates, as were degree requirements and department-specific information. Faculty information was about equally important to undergraduates and Master’s students. Financial aid information was more important to undergraduates than Master’s students, as were research areas/areas of study and student life.
Degree requirements, career outcomes, and department-specific information were the most important factors to Master’s students. Student life and faculty information were the least important to Master’s students.
Research areas/areas of study, financial aid, degree requirements were the most important factors to undergraduates. Student life, faculty information, and department-specific information were the least important factors to undergraduates.
Most students selected “student profile” as the most engaging, followed by videos. Master’s students preferred student profiles, followed by videos, images, and lastly, qutoes. Undergraduates, on the other hand, preferred videos, followed by student profiles, quotes, and images. The unknown affiliation students are those who filled out the s_15 survey. These students preferred student profiles.
Most students responded that they would be “very likely” or “likely” to click on/download a PDF about programs and requirements.The same held true by student’s affiliation, which the exception of students with unknown affiliation.
All students selected that a sample schedule or curriculum information would be very helpful or helpful in their decision making process, and the vast majority thought this would be very helpful. The same holds true when broken down by student’s affiliation.
| Word | Raw Frequency | TF-IDF Score |
|---|---|---|
| faculti | 12 | 14.327070 |
| not | 13 | 14.281960 |
| research | 13 | 12.110257 |
| know | 10 | 11.939225 |
| much | 8 | 11.336528 |
| want | 7 | 10.854182 |
| michigan | 5 | 10.551066 |
| interest | 6 | 10.228489 |
| chose | 4 | 9.591581 |
| public | 4 | 9.591581 |
| Topic | Example |
|---|---|
| Research Interest | 100% was a leading factor in why I chose Michigan Public Health. I wanted to know what their past and current research interests were and up to date publications. |
| Accessibility | Their acccessibility was why I chose Michigan over other schools. I wanted to know why they chose Michigan. |
| Teaching | Well, I’m not actually IN the SPH, but I heard Sheila (my PH 200 professor) was great from other students, and so their testimonials for her played a big part in my decision to take her course in the first place. |
| Not Much | I didn’t know much about the faculty but have heard in the past that U of M has great staff in whichever program that’s chosen. |
Most students selected social media as another place they would look for information when applying to a school, but a fair number also selected “other websites”. Not many students selected “print material” or “other”. The overall analysis held true for Master’s students, but undergraduates preferred social media, with just 1 or 2 students selecting each of the other options.